Then: The Eighteen Sixties

 

Lucius Shepard’s 1993 vampire novel The Golden is set in eastern Europe in 1860, and seems to be broadly compatible with Doctor Who’s vampire narrative.

 

Nurse Who?   Comic story, published 2018                                    Doctor: 10

Featuring Gabby, Cindy

Written by Richard Dinnick.

Takes place in London. Historically, Elizabeth Garret Anderson became a nurse in 1860 CE.

The Good, the Bad and the Alien   Novel, published 2011     Doctor: 11

Featuring Amy, Rory

Written by Colin Brake.

Takes place in Nevada; self-dated 1861 CE.

Worm   Charity short story, published 1998                                    Doctor: 8

featuring Benny

Written by Lance Parkin.

Takes place in Hamburg in the early 1860s, at the time of “the first performance of Faustus”. I take this to mean the European tour of the original production of Gounod’s opera Faust. It is three years since Benny last met the Doctor’s seventh incarnation.

The Ghosts of Gralstead   Audio adaptation of an unproduced TV script, released 2014            Doctor: 4

Featuring Leela

Adapted by Marc Platt from a story by Philip Hinchcliffe.

Takes place in London and the Congo; concluding in April 1861 CE.

The Broken Crown   Audio drama, released 2011                  Doctor: 4

Featuring Mrs Wibbsey

Written by Paul Magrs.

Takes place in Sussex; self-dated 1861 CE.

Aladdin Time   Audio drama, released 2011                              Doctor: 4

Featuring Mrs Wibbsey

Written by Paul Magrs.

Takes place under Sussex, immediately after The Broken Crown.

The Lampblack Wars   Short story, published 2005                    Doctor: 3

featuring Sarah Jane

Written by Matthew Sweet.

Takes place in London; self-dated mid-December 1861 CE.

Comforts of Home   Short story, published 2005                         Doctor: 5

featuring Turlogh

Written by Paul Kempshall.

Takes place in Virginia; self-dated Christmas, 1861 CE.

Right vs Left vs Wrong   Short story, published 2015                   Doctor: 0

Featuring Iris Wildthyme

Written by Paul Vayro.

Takes place in a version of Yorkshire; self-dated 1862 CE, for no discernible reason.

The Wildthyme Effect   Short story, published 2013                    Doctor: 0

Featuring Iris Wildthyme

Written by Nick Campbell.

Takes place pivotally in Oxford; self-dated summer, 1862 CE.

Empire of Death   Novel, published 2004                        Doctor: 5

featuring Nyssa, Queen Victoria

Written by David Bishop.

Takes place mainly in Clydesdale, in central Scotland; self-dated February, 1863 CE.

The Midnight Washerwomen   Short story, published 2010     Doctor: 0

Featuring Iris Wildthyme

Written by Scott Handcock.

Informed guess Takes place in southern Brittany, a peninsula on the coast of France between the English Channel and the Atlantic Ocean; self-dated the nineteenth century.

Doctor Who and the Rebel’s Gamble   Gamebook, published 1986                                                                                                                                                    Doctor: 6

featuring Harry, Peri

Written by William H Keith, Jr.

Takes place in the theatre of operations of General Lee’s Army of Virginia; ends in July 1863 CE.

Backtime   Comic story, published 1971                                              Doctor: 3

Written by Dick O’Neill.

Takes place in London, the USA and Australia; historically, the Gettysburg address was delivered in late 1863 CE (some weeks after the battle, meaning this story takes much longer than it looks). The “General Grant” illustrated is probably meant to be Ulysses S.Grant, who was actually several hundred miles west, taking the surrender of Vicksburg on the Mississippi. However, the picture looks nothing like U.S.Grant, and may be taken as an officer of the same name responsible for counter-intelligence on the Army of the Potomac staff.

The Contingency Club   Audio drama, released 2017  Doctor: 5

Featuring Adric, Nyssa, Tegan

Written by Phil Mulryne.

Takes place in London; self-dated 1864 CE.

The Runaway Train   Audio story, released 2010                  Doctor: 11

Feturing Amy

Written by Oli Smith.

Takes place in the south-western territories of the USA: probably New Mexico, as there is a rail link to Arizona, and Barnado deserted at the Battle of Galveston, and would have been wise to flee west. A date of 1864 CE is given (the year after the Battle of Galveston).

 

Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter (2012) is a vampire film compatible with Doctor Who narrative, given the variables in vampire vulnerability established well enough in canon.

 

Assassin in the Limelight   Audio drama, released 2008     Doctor: 6

featuring Evelyn

Written by Robert Ross.

Takes place in Washington DC; self-dated April 1865 CE.

Blood and Hope   Novella, published 2004                            Doctor: 5

featuring Peri, Erimem

Written by Iain McLaughlin.

Takes place in Virginia, culminating in April 1865 CE.

 

Those vexed by UNIT dating discrepancies should be grateful Jules Verne was never script editor. In his 1870 novel Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea he introduces the character of Captain Nemo: the novel’s events start in 1866. Nemo returns in his 1875 novel The Mysterious Island, the main action of which seems to conclude during 1865; but Nemo reappears as a much older man, for whom the events of the previous novel occured many years previously. As this is a Doctor Who chronology, we cannot discount the possibility that in addition to everything else, the remarkable Nemo is a time-traveller, but there is no actual evidence for it. If we are going to* link Verne’s Nemo to Alan Moore’s The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, then this novel is a better fit than the earlier one, revealing as it does Nemo’s Indian ethnicity and hatred of British imperialism.

*yes.

 

The Eleventh Tiger   Novel, published 2004                  Doctor: 1

featuring Barbara, Ian, Vicki, ?the Mandragora Helix

Written by David A McIntee

Takes place in Guangzhou, a port on the southeast coast of China; self-dated September 1865 CE.

The Evil of the Daleks   TV story, broadcast 1967        Doctor: 2

featuring the Daleks, Jamie, Victoria

Written by David Whitaker, script edited by Gerry Davis and Peter Bryant.

Takes place in London and, pivotally, Kent, self-dated 1866 CE, and before The Age of Ambition. Victoria leaves linear time, being escorted at gunpoint into a Dalek Time Corridor.

The Age of Ambition   Short story, published 2004                    Doctor: 2

featuring Jamie, Victoria

Written by Andrew Campbell.

Takes place in Kent; self-dated June 1866 CE.

The Silvering   Comic story, published 2016                                  Doctor: 8

Featuring Josie

Written by George Mann.

Takes place in Edinburgh; self-dated October 1866.

Strange England: Prelude   Illustrated short story, published 1994      Doctor: 0

Written by Simon Messingham.

Takes place in Edinburgh (which is no sort of England); self-dated 1867 CE.

The Haunting of Thomas Brewster   Audio drama, released 2008

Doctor: 5

featuring Nyssa, Thomas

Written by Jonathan Morris.

Takes place in London; mostly in November 1867 CE. Thomas leaves linear time, dematerialising the TARDIS with himself aboard.

Unnatural Selection   Comic story, published 2013        

Doctors: 1, with 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 (glimpse)

Featuring Barbara, Ian, Vicki and Vortis (informative mention)

Written by Scott and David Tipton.

Takes place in London; self-dated 1868 CE.

Death Cloud   Novel, published 2010                             Doctor: 0

Featuring Sherlock Holmes

Written by Andy Lane.

Takes place in Surrey and London; self-dated the end of the school summer holidays, 1868 CE. Obviously I can’t chase up every post-Conan Doyle Sherlock Holmes story, but Macmillan Books Young Sherlock Holmes novels are written by Andy Lane, very much of this parish.

Industrial Evolution   Audio drama, released 2011        Doctor: 6

Featuring Thomas, Evelyn

Written by Eddie Robson.

Takes place in Lancashire, not long after The Haunting of Thomas Brewster.

Red Leech   Novel, published 2010                                  Doctor: 0

Featuring Sherlock Holmes

Written by Andy Lane.

Takes place in Surrey and the USA; some months after Death Cloud.

Peril On the Sea   Comic story, published 2011                             Doctor: 11

Featuring the Ockorans, Amy or an Amy ganger, Rory

Written by Eddie Robson.

Informed guess Takes place on Ockora, implicitly some time before The Murder Game.

Black Ice   Novel, published 2011                                     Doctor: 0

Featuring Sherlock Holmes

Written by Andy Lane.

Takes place in London and Russia; after Red Leech.

Bedlam   Short story, published 2011                                     Doctor: 0

Featuring Sherlock Holmes

Written by Andy Lane.

Takes place in London, after Black Ice.

The Morton Legacy   Audio drama, released 2017          Doctor: 2

Featuring Polly, Ben, Jamie

Written by Justin Richards.

Informed guess Takes place in London; self-dated “a hundred years” before Polly and Ben’s time.

Fire Storm   Novel, published 2011                                  Doctor: 0

Featuring Sherlock Holmes

Written by Andy Lane.

Takes place in regional England and Edinburgh; after Bedlam. Holmes is still fourteen.

Snake Bite   Novel, published 2012                                  Doctor: 0

Featuring Sherlock Holmes

Written by Andy Lane.

Takes place at sea and in China; after Fire Storm.

Knife Edge   Novel, published 2013                                 Doctor: 0

Featuring Sherlock Holmes

Written by Andy Lane.

Takes place in Ireland; after Snake Bite.

Stone Cold   Novel, published 2014                                 Doctor: 0

Featuring Sherlock Holmes

Written by Andy Lane.

Takes place in Oxford; after Knife Edge.

Night Break   Novel, published 2015                               Doctor: 0

Featuring Sherlock Holmes

Written by Andy Lane.

Takes place in regional England, at sea and in Egypt; after Stone Cold. It’s been a busy fifteen months for Holmes, as this novel ends with the opening of the Suez Canal in November 1869 CE.

The Unquiet Dead   TV story, broadcast 2005                       Doctor: 9

Featuring Rose

Written by Mark Gatiss, script supervised by Russell T Davies.

Takes place in Cardiff; self-dated Christmas Eve, 1869 CE.

 

 

 

Total Stories Considered               3574

Proportion Written By Women   12%                                        

 

Top Docs

4                 329 stories                   

3                 292 stories

7                 275 stories         

10               248 stories   

8                 245 stories   

5                 236 stories   Climber!          

11               236 stories   

1                 214 stories         

6                 207 stories  

2                 194 stories         

12               120 stories

Unbound   91 stories  

9                 65 stories  

13               53 stories           

War            45 stories                     

 

 

Top Twenty Recurring Elements

 

London                                                                717 stories         

Regional England                                               596 stories

UNIT                                                                    406 stories

The Time Lords                                                  405 stories

Alastair, Kate, Kadiatu, Lucy Weston and the Lethbridge-Stewart family                                                                                       400 stories

Continental Europe                                           282 stories

North America                                                   278 stories

Wales                                                                  246 stories

Torchwood                                                         233 stories  

The Daleks and Davros                                     227 stories   

Sarah Jane                                                          222 stories  

The Master, including Missy                            216 stories   

Captain Jack                                                       192 stories

The K9s                                                               162 stories  

Ace                                                                      161 stories 

Romana                                                               156 stories  

Christmas                                                            143 stories

At Sea                                                                  142 stories

Asia                                                                      139 stories           

Amy and Rory                                                    136 stories  Re-entry!   

 

 

Top Decades

 

The Teens                                                           1495 stories

The Noughties                                                    933 stories                   

The Nineties                                                       349 stories

The Twenties                                                     300 stories

The Seventies                                                    207 stories         

The Eighties                                                        203 stories

The Sixties                                                          87 stories  

 

 

And Top Twenty Years

 

2016                                                          215 stories

2018                                                          190 stories 

2017                                                           178 stories

2020                                                          176 stories  

2008                                                          174 stories  

2015                                                          166 stories 

2011                                                          150 stories   Climber!  

2019                                                          143 stories  

2021                                                          143 stories  

2013                                                          141 stories   

2009                                                          140 stories   Climber!

2010                                                          122 stories

2001                                                          114 stories

2007                                                          109 stories 

2014                                                          106 stories  

2005                                                          90 stories   Climber!    

2006                                                          89 stories 

2004                                                          82 stories   Climber!       

2012                                                          82 stories Climber!

1993                                                          81 stories           

           

  

 

         

 

 

Total Writers (including showrunners, script editors, anthology linking material writers)                                  950

Proportion of Female Writers           17%      

 

Top Twenty Writers

 

Terrance Dicks                                          119 stories  

James Goss                                               111 stories

Russell T Davies                                       109 stories

Paul Magrs                                                81 stories  

Justin Richards                                         80 stories           

Steven Moffat                                          68 stories           

Jonathan Morris                                      67 stories           

Gareth Roberts                                        49 stories  

John Dorney                                             48 stories           

Robert Holmes                                         48 stories  

Matt Fitton                                               46 stories  

Eddie Robson                                            46 stories   Climber!    

Eric Saward                                               46 stories           

Steve Lyons                                               40 stories  

Gary Russell                                              40 stories  

David Llewellyn                                       39 stories  

David Whitaker                                        39 stories   Climber!    

Alan Barnes                                              38 stories           

Marc Platt                                                 38 stories   Climber!    

? John Canning                                         37 stories=

Andrew Cartmel                                      37 stories=